EDITORIAL: Dismantle internal trade barriers

P.E.I. Premier Robert Ghiz is flanked by Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne and Nova Scotia Premier Stephen McNeil, left, and Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard, right, at the closing news conference of the annual Council of the Federation meeting in Charlottetown on Friday. (ANDREW VAUGHN/CP)

As expected, leaders of Canada’s provinces and territories meeting as the annual Council of the Federation, at sessions that wrapped up Friday in Charlottetown, agreed Ottawa is shortchanging them on money for health care and infrastructure renewal.

There were no dollar figures released, but within six months, the premiers say, they will let Ottawa know how much more they want.

True to another part of the annual ritual, the federal government has basically already told the premiers to forget it.

The premiers do have a point that an aging Canadian population will drive up health-care costs, though they don’t agree on how Ottawa should divvy up health-care transfers — other than the fact they should be larger.

The current per capita funding formula penalizes a province like Nova Scotia, with its relatively older population, where the population is not growing.

But while the premiers complain, with some justification, about a fiscal imbalance that projects growing deficits at the provincial level while Ottawa eyes ever larger surpluses, at the same time there’s been a relative lack of urgency by many provinces on a priority issue of the federal government — dismantling internal trade barriers that experts say are costing the national economy billions of dollars annually.

There were finally some modest signs of movement on that issue at this week’s meetings, though they represent only a fraction of what’s needed.

Nova Scotia and Alberta vowed to harmonize their apprenticeship programs, while New Brunswick and B.C. struck a similar agreement on apprenticeship mobility. Meanwhile, B.C. forged deals with Ontario and Saskatchewan to work to permit freer trade in wine and, in the latter case, craft spirits.

More substantively, Canada’s premiers also agreed to undertake a comprehensive review of the nearly 20-year-old Agreement on Internal Trade (AIT), a misnamed deal that in reality has simply maintained countless hurdles for doing business across Canada.

Pushed by premiers like Brad Wall of Saskatchewan, one of the three western provinces leading efforts to dismantle internal trade barriers — in part by example with the New West Partnership between B.C., Alberta and Saskatchewan — this is an opportunity for the council’s members to show they can rise above parochial interests to boost the entire nation’s economy.

We’re encouraged to see the four-premier steering committee which will lead this initiative includes Nova Scotia Premier Stephen McNeil, who’s spoken strongly in past about the importance of bringing down internal trade barriers and harmonizing domestic regulations.

But the proof will be in results. The target date for concluding negotiations on a revamped AIT is March, 2016, though plans for actions like better labour mobility are expected sooner. With recent international trade agreements often giving foreign companies more access to Canadian markets than domestic businesses, it’s long past time to knock down internal trade barriers.

Also, having Quebec finally agree to join all other provinces and territories as signatories to the council’s Canadian Energy Strategy initiative is welcome news.